Holy Christ, who wrote that article?
You know, it occurs to me that when rightwingers can't come up with a better argument than "you hate America," they might actually be projecting. After all, who was it that said that the 9/11 attacks allowed, quote, "the enemies of America to give us probably what we deserve"? It wasn't any leftist, that's for sure. It was that jolly old moral majoritarian, the Rev. Jerry Falwell.
Wait, wait, wait, who the hell is he to be bringing up stupid-ass political slogans/"arguments"? The Left's got "No Blood for Oil" (freeing Iraq actually has to do with us needing oil), which makes absolutely zero sense. Having a friendly dictator in power in an oil state would get us a whole lot more oil than levelling sanctions and destabilizing the region - plus, christ, oil is oil, it's a commodity, increasing supply out of Iraq won't shift the oil price enough to make a difference for America in particular. And then, again, America needs more oil least of all.
Falwell is on some sort of weird Authoritarian fringe of the right - he got slapped down for that comment by as many right-wingers as left-wingers. He's certainly further away from the center of the Republicans than, say, Nader is from the Democrats'.
"The more you think about it, the more it makes sense. The right can't stand American culture. Rock & roll swept the planet, helped bring down the Berlin wall, inspired everyone with its free-spirited, rebellious American energy. Who fought it every step of the way? The right, that's who. Same goes for hip-hop, another great American export, subject of Congressional inquisitions. And don't even get me started on Hollywood. Billions of people love our movies, but the right acts like the whole movie industry is the last refuge of Stalinism."
Heh - who was the one who started the PMRC (that group that labels rock and rap music and tried to keep some of it out of stores)? Tipper Gore, Al Gore's wife - and the rest of the PMRC was driven by Democrats, not Republicans. I like Lieberman, but he's not exactly got a blemish-free record when it comes to supporting music, movies, and video games. The idea that Republicans "fought" Rock music "every step of the way" is deeply stupid - one, no one fought it "every step of the way", and two, most major censorship-like efforts in the past 20 years have been Democrat-driven.
They had to be dragged kicking and screaming into making a holiday to honor the Rev. Martin Luther King, who helped us try to fulfill the promises of Reconstruction. And some of them still grumble, as Ronald Reagan did, that he was some kind of "communist." Still others, like John Ashcroft, express nostalgia for the Confederacy's fight to maintain slavery as a noble cause.
I think he means Trent Lott, not John Ashcroft. When Trent Lott made those comments, virtually the entire Republican party and most Republican political commentators rose up to immediately voice their disagreement with him and ask for his resignation. No issues of loyalty over morality or anything else like that - the party took care of it by itself. Not supporting the holiday is hardly indicative of racism, though it seems like a gimme and a useful cop to a lot of people.
Come to think of it, the right hates our constitution, too, except for the Second Amendment, and maybe the Eleventh, now that the Rehnquist Court has rewritten it to mean "Congress shall pass no law that we don't like." But the First, the Fourth, the Fifth, and um, the Sixth, and the Eighth, and pretty much the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments are right out the window these days. Damn shame, too, if you ask me. Plus the right is still itching to overturn old decisions like Miranda and Bakke and Roe, if not Griswald. Some of them aren't too crazy about Brown v. Board, either, if you know what I mean.
Heh, the fourteenth amendment is the one that allows the US Government to freely do things to restrict and stop citizens who give "aid and comfort" to the enemy, stop insurrections and rebellions and things like that. Kind of funny in this context. The other crap is all "ashroftt is turning the us into a pOlice statE!@!$!@$!! stuff, which, eh, people are welcome to believe that.
Really, though, the worst stuff is how he keeps pounding that racism button, and, I don't know, if the party's reaction to Lott doesn't prove to you that most of those racism accusations are bullshit, then I don't know what will. It's a horrid, stupid stereotype.
There's more, but I should go to class.
St00n